"Parseltongue" and the Basilisk (5)

No hesitation, no preparation, no incantation. His right foot stepped onto the stone slab at the edge of the fissure, and then his entire body plunged straight into the bottomless darkness like a falling meteor. His cloak billowed behind him like a dark green flag torn apart by the wind.

He used no slowing spell, no protective spell, nothing that could make his descent slower, steadier, or safer.

He simply fell. Wind howled past his ears, while cold air carrying the scent of dust from a thousand years below surged into the collar of his cloak and pressed his robes tightly against his body. His hair streamed upward in the wind like a mass of black fire set alight.

His eyes remained open. His scarlet Sharingan shone in the darkness like two burning stars, his gaze piercing the blackness, the air, and the ash-like gray-white particles dancing in the wind before settling on the ground rushing ever closer.

He landed, yet there was none of the violent impact that should have shattered the floor.

There was no sound.

Not "very little sound," but "no sound."

The soles of his boots touched the damp, viscous ground that glimmered with a dark green sheen, yet made no noise at all. It was not because he had controlled the impact of his landing—he had not deliberately done so. He had fallen straight down. From that height, at that speed, any living creature hitting the ground should have made a sound.

But he did not. Because at the instant his feet touched the ground, his body had turned into a mass of shadow, weightless and intangible. In that instant, his mass had been shifted into another dimension. The soles of his boots had merely "touched" the ground, not "struck" it.

Then his body condensed